WTEN owner will be auctioned

Young Broadcasting Inc., the owner of WTEN Ch. 10 in Albany and other television stations nationally, will go up for auction later this month.

Young, a New York City company, has long struggled with heavy debt since its 1999 purchase of KRON in San Francisco. In February, the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, citing the need “to bring its debt in line with current economic realities.”

The bankruptcy court has scheduled the auction for July 14, although bids are due by July 10, according to court documents filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Southern District of New York.

The auction date was first reported by The Tennessean newspaper in Nashville, which said that all of Young’s properties, including its 10 TV stations, are likely to be auctioned as a block, rather than broken into separate properties.

Peter Wolfson, an attorney for Young Broadcasting, could not immediately be reached for comment today.

I agree with post # 3. The talent is just not there. WRGB is a close second in the talent department. Both stations look as if they hired high schoolers for reporters, weather and news people. The only good station in the area is WNYT 13. They still pay for top talent in all areas. No wonder they are number one in the area.

The sad part is WTEN use to be a really good station. They still have some good people there John M., Elisa S. and Steve Cap. But they really need to improve their whole product, hopefully someone will buy it AND improve the station!!

People are not bidding on the talent at WTEN. They are bidding on the access to the airwaves. Young buried itself with too much corporate debt and now has to dump these properties to save its financial bacon.

The auction has nothing to do with ratings or the ability of anyone at the 10 stations. The Young ‘uns either dump these stations to raise money and lower debt or, horror of horrors, they’ll have to start giving up country club memberships and private jets.

Look, I have little use for WTEN these days and not very much for the business, and it is a business, of publicly traded companies that just happen to sell journalism as their products. See the Michael Jackson Glorification Tour and John & Kate Make Me Regurgitate for more details. See the absence of a series of in-depth, well-developed stories about financial regulation and/or the quality of health care in ours, the richest nation in the world.

But don’t hang this one on the ratings of newscasts. This auction has nothing to do with new blondes and their Ivy backgrounds and MBAs who use phonetically spelled Hebrew terminology to cite their affinity for a fictional bovine. This is strictly about bond ratings and extremely stupid investment by the Young ‘uns.

Read the obituary of the former Journal Register CEO Bobby Jelenic to obtain the finest print example about how the misuse of leverage and the publicly traded investment status continues to destroy the craft, skill, and dedication that was once journalism.

#6 is right. The blame for the current state-of-affairs @ YBI lies with top management. What the average viewer is seeing on-air is purely a result of that bad management. Many, many good/talented (and aesthetically appealing) people have come and gone through the doors at WTEN. I was privileged to work with them for 20+ years, which I will always cherish. I wish only the best for this station. It deserves better than what Young has given.

i worked at WTEN in the early ’90’s. I left when I was offered a higher paying job and WNYT. I went to the GM and said I’d stick around for a little more money- They coiuldn’t match what 13 offered ( nearly 10 grand raise) but I really liked the people. He pointed to a stack of resumes and said, ” These are people ready to do your job for less than you make now.”

I hope they can recover. We certainly don’t need more people out of work. Personally, I think WTEN has some good talent: John McLoughlin, Elisa Streeter, Steve Caporizzo, Mark O’Brien, and Demetra Ganias.

I think Ch. 10 has some diamonds in the rough, as comments #9 and others mentioned. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem that management “polishes” the product, so to speak, so that the gems can sparkle. A prime example is all the split-anchor newscasts. Just like a dance, there needs to be chemistry in order for the dancers to connect with the audience. There’s no chemistry/flow in any of the newscasts because they’re constantly playing a game of hot potato (tossing from anchor to anchor to anchor to reporter to anchor to weather to anchor to anchor, etc.). There are other problems, too (e.g., pointing to hard-to-see video in a small graphic inside a TV inside inside your TV, and spending more time on national stories than local ones). Maybe fresh ownership–and an infusion of cash–could improve things?

WTEN had, and still has, some great talent. But Young Broadcasting doesn’t share that distinction. It was their short-sighted purchase of an overpriced NBC affiliate that got everyone into this mess. This began in 1999, so it wasn’t the economy that sunk Young. It was the stupidity.

You don’t go into a bidding war over a TV station, against NBC, and hope to win. NBC pulled their affiliation from the station, and Young was left with a plummeting ad revenue from a practically worthless KRON.

WTEN was convincing employees to leave as early as 2001, by changing their job descriptions. Why? To make them quit, without seeking unemployment.

But life will go on, with liquid lunches and golden parachutes for the Young’uns. The people whose lives have actually been altered by YBI’s greed and financial idiocy are the talented employees of WTEN, and the other stations unfortunate enough to be owned by Young.